Comments on: The Period of Purple Crying

By: Head Jammer

Head Jammer — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 19:04:22 +0000

Hi Agamor, thank you for your comment and sharing your story. You raise a good point, and I agree that parents should do their best to find out what is going on, and yet, there truly can be situations where the baby is just crying because he/she is frustrated, feeling fussy at the end of the day, or overstimulated, or just tired, and in those cases, even though you try your best, they cannot be calmed, and this is what the period of purple crying is. So if there is a health issue, it definitely needs to be addressed, but in the cases I have experienced (now with three children), there was no health issue, and all my children are healthy, it really was just a temporary period of purple crying.

By: Agamor

Agamor — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:02:26 +0000

I beg to differ. My daughter started exhibiting these symptoms when she was 3 days old, still at the hospital. I tried to breastfeed her but she was mostly bottle fed before my milk came in 3 days after she was born. We spent 2 hellish months trying to find the right formula (eventually she got Neocate and she was fine within a few days.) Before that she was gassy, IN PAIN and had blood in her stool, mostly invisible to a naked eye and detected by a special test. Once it was clearly in her diaper. I think the theory of purple crying may be harmful as it will put parents minds at peace while they should be trying to get help. My daughter had milk protein allergy and if I kept on feeding her milk based formulas her neurological system could have been badly damaged.

By: Barb

Barb — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 05:10:28 +0000

I find many young couples expierencing babies crying and they are Cold. New Borns need to be warm, just think you carried this baby around for 9 months in this nice warm body. Baby is born and out into the cold world it comes. If they are cold they will cry and not sleep either. My daughter insisted the cute look ! The child would wake up at night and want to crawl into bed with her. Or that was the way they could quiet the child when an infant. Babies kick the covers off they will get cold and be unhappy and cry. I would suggest blanket sleepers over PJ’s Oh no, I finally gave up and let her figure it out. The 2nd baby wore blanket sleepers at night and they didn’ thave tha problem.
My DIL also wondered why her new born was fussy and crying, I said you need to wrap him in a recieving blanket. she said it’s 100 degrees out. I said yes but you have the AC on and ceiling fans going. That air circulating cools his little body down. She finally understood. And had a much happier baby, I too beleive a child crying is trying to tell you they are unahppy about something.
My son had a tight spinter muscle and was having problems having a BM . Different baby after we visited the Dr , and he showed him how to relieve the problem.. this child also had a milk allergy ! Much happier on a soy formula… Hope this helps some of you…
that have crying infants.. Keep them warm and well fed. You’ll all be much happier. Nursing Mothers You are what you eat, you eat gassy foods you’ll have a gassy baby, and that weight you wnat to loose. Not eating much or skipping meals, Remember your producing milk from Your Body.

By: steph

steph — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 16:15:20 +0000

Cher my baby is EBF and never had a bottle and experienced this…

By: Head Jammer

Head Jammer — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 02:03:41 +0000

Thanks for your comments Aly!

By: ALY

ALY — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 22:28:50 +0000

I breastfed my baby too, and she screamed for 4 hours a night non-stop no matter what we did. We didn’t just sit there and stare at her either. We held her, swang her, took her for drives, walked her, bounced her. It didn’t matter. However, her bottle fed sister barely cried when she had a wet diaper. So I wouldn’t discount this period of time. It’s interesting how people can take their experiences and overgeneralize it into thinking it’s the same for everyone. I try not to do that.

Another thing, I have never heard of autism signs appearing under the age of 2, and I have never heard of crying being a sign of autism. I don’t want people with crying babies to be panicking. Autism usually is displayed by a LACK of communication (i.e. not smiling, not crying, not verbalizing.)

I am not an expert, but I am a social worker that works with the 0-3 population and have some experience.

By: Brandon

Brandon — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 17:38:31 +0000

@cher: you are lucky! please check out this very interesting information shown here which talks about the crying curve in other cultures where babies are fed constantly and also in other animals. go half-way down the page where it starts with “a second reason..”

http://www.purplecrying.info/sections/index.php?sct=2&sctpg=2&

this would indicate that crying is not always a result of the some of the things you’d mentioned such as feeding schedule and formula

@head jammer: great topic and information! soothing techniques are great but unfortunately there’s no evidence showing that there’s a magic calming reflex or 4th trimester as provided by HBOTB. thanks so much!

By: Head Jammer

Head Jammer — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 04:40:18 +0000

Hi Carmen, thanks for your comment… that is indeed a difficult situation and happens to a lot of parents. On the bright side, at least you can stop the crying by carrying her, so I think that is helpful. The Happiest Baby on the Block is a good resource for alternative methods to calm the baby in these cases as well.

By: carmen

carmen — Sun, 06 Mar 2011 05:38:11 +0000

My daughter is 5 weeks old and has just begun these crying episodes but they seem to start cuz I put her down and won’t carry her. She does seem to have a sensitive stomach but we mexican americans call this “embrazilado” meaning the baby is used to being carried and will ry when put down cuz they just want to be carried. I just don’t know what to do. I feel so overwhelmed cuz my son was nothing like this!

By: Head Jammer

Head Jammer — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 06:03:52 +0000

Hi Cher, thanks for your comment and for sharing your experiences. Our babies were breastfed and well taken care of, yet we still experienced this period, and know many parents who did. There is also research that supports the existence of this period. Perhaps you were lucky not to encounter it, but I would not discount its existence.
Sure, like you say, it is worth the effort to see what you can do to comfort the baby, and that should be your first course of action.
However, I truly believe that sometimes there really is nothing you can do to stop the crying… I experienced it myself… despite all one’s best efforts and intentions, sometimes nothing works, and if we don’t accept that as a fact, we risk overly frustrating ourselves, possibly becoming aggressive, and even becoming depressed.
So sometimes it really is better, if you have tried all you can, and still can’t calm the baby, to just take a break.